Was this close <---> to buying Vista, coz well, its the next big thing, DX10 is out for it and soon it will be more convenient to just switch over. But thought, fek it, ill get a shot of my friends copy first to try it briefly.

Thank goodness I didn't buy it. The years of beta testing has obviously not done much. I know there are many people using it happily, but there are many systems that should be able to install it that cant.

After searching google for my problem (installation hangs at the 'Completing Installation...' stage) it seems I am not at all the only one. The bigger problem is that there doesnt seem to be a solution. Some brand new hardware configurations on which XP works perfectly, vista just cannot install. People with my mobo (Asus P5N-E) are reporting to have the problem, but also some other systems. It is definitely not my copy of vista, since then i have downloaded 2 other versions that work for many people.

Sigh, rant over, i still hate microsoft!!!

http://www.sipifi.com/screenshots/image.php?i...3b6a65.png

I wonder if it real.

Dunno if there has been posts about it before, but you should check out Bloodmasters ( http://www.bloodmasters.com ). It is basically quake, but from a birds eye view. Similar weapons and maps, but a totally new game with totally new skills needed!

It is only like 1 day old, so its a good time to build up skilllz.

(Screenshots on the website in the 'about' section)

This is one of those personal journal entries about ones life etc, so if your not a fan of them, then stop reading :)

So, it finally happened; I split up with my girlfriend. Of course it is very common, I have seen many similar journal entries, but it sucks. We are both 22, and have been together for about 2 years, had our ups and downs, but now its over. It sucks.

The message that I somehow wanted to encode in this journal, is that no matter how sure you are that you found the person you will be spending the rest of your life with, you can be wrong. Among our friends, we were known to be the closest couple by far; always very passionate about eachother, we have been living together since before we were going out (since we were flat mates), and later bought a flat together.

For 99.9% of our relationship I know we were both convinced that we will be together for ever. We could quite comfortably talk about marriage and even kids. We already planned out what all our kids will be called for both girls and boys.

But then it was gone. The spark, the passion, the love.

Maybe this intense closeness is what destroyed our relationship, but being so very close is what felt right; it is what defined our relationship. This intense feeling that no matter what happens, there will always be that one person who will be there for you.

I know that eventually most people find 'the one', but dont ever think you have, until your 70 years old, and that person is still by your side.

It really sucks to be alone after the last 2 years of my life.

Having swiftly given up on RF online, I have now moved on to auto assault. I must say, I really enjoy it! Similar sort of feeling I got as when I started WoW. Lots of quests, stuff to do etc. Plus its just great fun driving around, the fact that you have to travel to locations is no longer boring, since the physics and 'feel' of driving can make any journey fun, along with the fact that pretty much everything is destructible. I have not came across pvp yet, but its meant to be top notch.

Prob is, there are not many players yet (considering its just hit shelves) but I am sure that will change.

Any other players here? What is everyones opinion?

Also, if you only played it in beta, it has changed loooaads, so dont flame the game for its state during development ;o

Anyone got http://www.codemasters.com/rfonline ? What do you think?

Seems alright for now, needed change from wow.

If anyone is considering getting it, go on the Fire server, since that was started for the UK release (ie least amount of high lvls).

I went from my built in nforce sound (which is meant to be really good) to an audigy 2 zs, and holy crap the difference is huge - and I am not even talking about sound.

Sure, the sound sounds 10x better, with things like EAX Advanced HD enabled, but it improves framerates dramatically.

The rail feels like a different weapon. Until now it felt really heavy, and had this kinda 'lag' feel whenever i shot it (not talking about connection lag), but now it is so smooth. RL and GL feel a lot better too, although not on such a large extent as the rail.

Seems like im promoting a product, but I am just blown away by the difference. Maybe I had sound problems before, but now the game feels so much smoother, i'm well happy.

So want more FPS in quake4? Do NOT get a new gfx card (especially if your config is tweaked, it will make 0 difference). Get a good GAMING sound card , and if you have that, then get new CPU. New gfx card should be the last thing on the list, unless the one you have is very crap (assuming you tweaked your gfx settings low).


Edit: Does using EAX Advanced HD reduce performance? it certainly sounds better, and even with it enabled, my performance is much better compared to what it was before i got the new sound card. But sound is great without advanced hd, so if it is a performance intensive feature, i would turn it off...?

Guess i'll join the club and post my views about the recent burst of Q4 in our lives.

People are always going on about upgrading pc again for Q4 .. if you look at the maps, they are actually fairly simply with regards to geometry, and the poly-count seems low. It uses the doom3 philosophy (which I think is a great one) where detail is added using bumbmapping, other shaders, effects etc. The good thing about that, is that they can all be turned off, and once they are, you are left with something that is technologically not much more demanding than Q3. I prefer this much more over epic's philosophy, where each iteration of UT simply meant higher poly counts, with not much improvement on the engine itself.
I am certainly going to hold onto my x800 pro and xp3000, as I do not think it will be a problem running it with the details you would want to run Q4 at to stay competitive.

With regards to gameplay,
One of the most relevant introductions IMO, which has only been briefly mentioned on some sites, is the new tourney mode built into Q4 (Instanced map on a server, with more than one unrelated duel is happening on a map on a server; winners play eachother and loosers play eachother + single elimination tourney).

I mentioned it before in another thread, but I think this is a very significant feature being in it from the start, and not added later or done using a mod.

It will make duelling much more accessible, and newbies wont give up after being raped silly, because rather than being faced with rape after rape, you will be faced with opponents more suitable for your skill level after each loss (loosers play loosers). You will still play harder players, which is good because you need that too to learn, but its not gonna be rape after rape, where you are not really learning anything.

The importance of making dueling more accessible is significant, because as we all know duelling is where the big tourneys, events and money is at (based on quake3's life). So by making duelling more accessible, it will have a bigger player base, and in turn a bigger spectator base etc. All in all, it will be better for the competitive community, and hopefully there is not going to be such big divides between your average joe and the competitive gaming followers/players.

So whats everyone doing on valentines day with their gf/bf? Anyone got any interesting romantic activities planned? Or will it be just the typical box of chocolates and dinner in fancy restaurant? I need ideas!

Im runnin out of bands to listen to, so I'm wondering if people here could recommend some stuff to listen to, if their taste in music is similar to mine. Preferably not major mainstream stuff, as I am probably aware of those bands too.

Heres my favourite bands:

Incubus
Hoobastank
Lit
Guano Apes
Dashboard Confessional
Brand New
Billy Talent
Weezer
Jimmy eat world
Lostprophets

etc. as you can see im into alternative stuff :o, so any recommendations?

http://lsr.the-dark-room.net/potd/archives/000154.php